Moon Called by Patricia Briggs, is the first book in a new series. The narrator is Mercedes Thompson aka Mercy. She’s a “walker” who has a brotherhood with the coyote and runs her own mechanic shop in the Tri-Cities. Love the paw print tattoo, don’t you?
I thoroughly enjoyed this urban fantasy by Patricia Briggs that is set in the Tri-Cities. Excellent characterization, plot, dialogue and action. Former and current fans of Laurell K. Hamilton would get a kick out of this novel. Briggs has all kinds of supernatural creatures that populate her world. They include the fae, gremlins, trolls, vampires and a couple of sexy werewolves.
Mercy’s a mechanic by trade who calls the coyote her brothers since they share a history. She was adopted and was raised with a werewolf pack before striking off on her own. Her next door neighbor is the sexy Adam Hauptman, an Alpha of the werewolf pack of the Tri-Cities. In this world of Briggs, the fae have already been “outed” to the human world by their leaders simply because they were forced to come out due to unfortunate circumstances. Other supernatural creatures fear that it is only a matter of time before their secrets are revealed to the world. It is this external conflict that drives most of the story.
The story starts with Mercy asking Adam’s help with the new wolf, Mac, who comes looking for a job at her shop. Note: New wolves are dangerous since they have yet to gain control of their wolf. Under an Alpha, new wolves learn how to control their wolf and their killing instincts. Also, lone wolves are werewolves who reject the pack and they are rare and are discouraged. Also, there is always an Alpha or dominant who watches over all the werewolves in the US. The Marrock are the leaders of all the werewolf packs in the US. The leader is Bran, a werewolf several centuries old who controls all the werewolves and makes sure they do not cause any harm to humans or reveal their existence to humans. New wolves who survive the Change but who can’t seem to control their wolf and pose a threat to their family and society—they are eliminated.
Besides Bran, there’s his son Dr. Samuel Cornick, a dominant, sexy werewolf and medical doctor who is also Mercy’s first love. They meet again after many years apart — albeit not in the best circumstances. They both still carry some baggage that you usually identify with broken relationships and such. There’s still interest between the two but neither one tries to act on it. Not yet anyway. Towards the end of the novel you start to see a triangle of sorts develop between Adam, Samuel and Mercy, which is to be explored later. I can’t wait.
Anyway, back to the plot: Adam is attacked one evening after pack business and is left nearly dead. Mercy takes him to Bran and they help him heal and figure out what the heck is going on. To Mercy’s dismay, Bran sends Samuel back to the Tri-Cities with her and Adam. Both men are territorial and give Mercy a hard time. As the plot progresses, we try to figure out what happened to Adam, who’s behind the attacks and such. We meet all kinds of paranormal creatures along the way who help Mercy and the gang expose the culprit(s). The author does her share of throwing out red herrings left and right but hey, it didn’t deter me too much. Also: I did not skim. Not one page. I admit the author took too much time explaining stuff at points where I wanted to get to the action. That’s the only complaint I had. The mystery wasn’t difficult to figure out but it wasn’t easy either.
I plan to keep this book and I have already emailed this author to gush about this book and I am praying hard that this is the start of a new series. I really like Brigg’s spin on the monsters she creates in her world. We all know that these creatures don’t exist, but she manages to make you—the reader–believe that this world does exist. The plot was sound. Dialogue excellent. This book is a keeper for the reasons stated above and also there are a few scenes that I’ve gone back to reread.
I also picked up and am reading Dragon Bones, the first book in the duology that JenniferL said she enjoyed just recently. I am enthralled. Thanks for the heads up on this one, J. I look forward to Ms. Briggs next installment in this new series.
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